


Remember

by TypicalJadeBlood



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Genocide Run, Other, Sadness, Sans dies instead of Papyrus au, Skeleton feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-09
Updated: 2016-04-30
Packaged: 2018-04-30 18:42:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 8,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5175365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TypicalJadeBlood/pseuds/TypicalJadeBlood
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You'll make it there just in time to miss the culprit, but you'll know who it was. And you'll know what they'll do. And it'll all.<br/>Be.<br/>Your.<br/>Fault.” </p><p>In which Papyrus wasn't there to save his brother, and he vows to stop the one who did this.<br/>Also in which it's the Genocide run and the skelebros switch places and there is MUCH ANGST.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Waterfall.

Aptly named, for the sounds of rushing and falling water filled the air, echoed through the stone corridors and the sweet blue flowers. The echo flowers gently roared with the forever repeating sounds of water, but now were repeating a new sound, that of footfalls somewhere, bouncing with each new iteration of the sound.

The skeleton’s boots crunched lightly on gravel and small flora as he walked through the caverns, ducking and shifting occasionally to make sure he didn’t scrape his shoulders or skull on the stone. His brother was lazy, but he was observant, and would probably wonder where the cracks and scrapes came from. Not that Papyrus was particularly worried about that, a cool guy like him didn’t need to explain random forays into the next area. His traps would hold until he returned.

The cavern ahead of him slowly opened up, in here the sound of rushing water was quieter, having to echo a long ways just to slip through the opening. A stream trickled past his boot to the far end of the cavern, winding like a snake through fields of soft blue echo flowers. This was always his favorite spot to think, but he hadn't come to think today. Today he was meeting someone.

There was a hole in the black and blue colors, a spot of bright yellow in the middle of the of the clearing. A single golden flower, with an actual face between its sunburst petals. Like always, it was smiling.

“Hiya!” cried the little plant, in a sweet, honey-like voice at Papyrus’s approach. It always used that sweet voice, laden with flattery and praise and sometimes prediction.

“The Great Papyrus has decided to come back! To grant you an audience once more!” the skeleton declared as he sat down, grinning. He liked this flower, most of the ones around here just whispered past conversations and secrets, but he didn't care much for secrets. Flattery though, was a different matter.

“I'm so honored~” it giggled, bending its stem slightly, in an imitation of a bow. “I've got something extra super special to tell you, I'm sure you'll be excited to hear. I've heard through the plant vine that a human might be finally coming your way and-”

“REALLY?!” The cry was sharp and sudden, Flowey bending back slightly as Papyrus punched the air in excitement. “Oh boy oh boy we're gonna capture a human and I'll finally be made a member of the Royal Guard!” Papyrus continued his small bone-rattling before seeing an even bigger grin on the flower's face. “What is it? What could be more more important than another human?”

Flowey giggled, his voice still laden with honey as he turned his face up to the skeleton. “Oh, not good news for you, news for me. You probably wouldn't care about lil’ ol’ me’s little joys in life.”

“Oh, but I do!” Papyrus claimed, a hand over his chest, over his SOUL. “I, the great Papyrus, will listen to your botanical excitement!”

“Oh, it's nothing too important.” If the flower had shoulders, it might have done a passive shrug. “Just a little prediction for you, to carry in your little ribcage. You're all going to die~”

There was silence. For a few moments Papyrus held his grin, before confusion crossed his skull and he glanced down to the flower. “...the great Papyrus must not have heard-” He tried, but Flowey cut him off, a bit of the sweetness gone from his voice, turning colder with each word.

“You heard it right. All of your friends are gonna die, mister skeleton, and it's all going to be your fault!” With that, the flower doubled over, giggling like it was mad. Papyrus, shocked, scrambled back to his feet, the boots sinking slightly in the damp earth.

“I don't know why you'd threaten my friends,” Papyrus started, eye sockets narrowing at Flowey, whose giggling was finally dying down. “But they're stronger than you think, and I won't let you!”

“Stupid skeleton.” There was no guise now, every word was cold and malicious. Even the smile had no warmth, it was cruel. “Every one of them is going to die, and you won't be able to do anything. Alphys, Undyne, Asgore...Sans…”

“That's enough!” Papyrus frowned, an expression rather unfamiliar to him. He decided right then that he didn't like it. “I don't care who you're threatening, but no one brings my brother into it. I may be cool, but he's stronger than he looks.” And with that, Papyrus stood, turning and heading back towards the entrance of the cavern. He'd just reached it when he heard Flowey calling after him.

“You wouldn't be afraid if you didn't believe me!”

He paused, one skeletal hand on the edge of the entrance.

“My predictions haven't been wrong before. It's how you made most of your friends.”

A longer pause this time, the seconds slipping by like snails on a racetrack. Flowey had him now. It made sure these next words were direct, hooking.

“I know how to save them.”

 

* * *

 

“Well, not so much somehow, as someone.” Flowey said off handedly, enjoying the desperate look on Papyrus’s skull. It had him, now to reel it in~

“Then who?” He didn't want to believe this flower, not one bit. But if there was one thing he believed, it was that there was some good in everyone. And it hadn't steered him wrong yet… “Give me the name and I shall ask them! No one could deny a plea from the great Papyrus!”

Flowey giggled, the sound had lost all of its mirth, a poor facsimile of the laughter before. “Stop playing dumb with me, you know exactly who it is.”

“King Dreemurr?” Papyrus offered, to the immediate scoffing of the golden flower.

“Do you really believe that that ancient goat could possibly help anyone?” The grin was cruel, stretching far wider than any smile had any right to be, stretching the face of the flower outwards. “He's useless, and he'll die in the end too.”

Papyrus reeled back in surprise. He'd never heard anything ill of Asgore, only praises of his kindness and strength. Hearing such contempt for a nice man threw him for a loop, so Flowey stepped in to fill the silence. “I'll give you a hint, if you're so dedicated to this stupid game. He's very close to you.”

That narrowed the playing field, for Papyrus down to only one possible candidate. “Sans?”

That laugh again, this flower really liked to laugh. Before he had enjoyed the kind laughter, but now it made his bones crawl. “Trust me, that smiley trashbag won't be helping you. He doesn't care nearly enough.”

“Then who could it be?” Papyrus mused, running a hand under his jaw, before being interrupted with a resounding groan.

“For the love of...I'm talking about Gaster!” Flowey almost screeched, tired of this idiot act.

“...Gaster?” Papyrus tilted his skull slightly, that name...he might have heard it once, but it didn't ring any bells. “I don't know a Gaster.”

“Of course you do!” Flowey was angry now, some red creeping into the cores of his petals. A new element this time...maybe this reset could turn out better. “Come on, you've gotta be in there somewhere, Gaster. I know what happened to you, I saw it all those resets ago.”

The flower was talking, but Papyrus didn't hear. Something about that name...the longer he thought, he thought he could feel something deep inside his SOUL. A slow, rhythmic pulse, beating like a drum inside his skull. It felt powerful, but he pushed it away.

“Look,” Papyrus said, standing up once more from the flower, now nearly scarlet. “I don't know who that is, but it doesn't matter. None of my friends are going to die, I know it.”

“...you really are stupid, aren't you?”

Skeletal fingers closed into a slow fist. The pulse was back, stronger now. “What did you just say to me?”

“I said you really are as stupid as you look!” Flowey drew itself up to its full, rather unimpressive height. “I thought that maybe, just maybe, you'd be the half who actually would be strong enough. But no, I guess all you became was a BONEHEAD WHO WILL WATCH HIS FRIENDS DIE, AND BE POWERLESS TO STOP IT!”

If Papyrus had skin, his knuckles would be bone white. The pulse was much louder, a drum behind his eye sockets as the flower continued. “You won't even get to watch your brother die, how sad is that?” The flower's face turned into a cruel mockery of a sad, teary-eyed face. “You'll make it there just in time to miss the culprit, but you'll know who it was. And you'll know what they'll do. And it'll all.

Be.

 _Your_.

 _Fault_.”

“ **SHUT UP**!!”

It had been faster than Flowey could have expected. Thin, bone fingers closed around the flower and riiiiped it from the earth, eliciting a shrill screech from the flower, it hadn’t seen this coming, this was new, this was terrifying. The face of the flower turned up to look at Papyrus and found a monster in his place.

Papyrus had never been so angry. That pulse had become a steady roar in his skull, and it filled him with anger, with hate, and with...power. He had never felt so powerful before, even in daydreams. A fire burned in his right eye socket, a flickering iris of blazing orange as it stared down the shivering flower.

The flower coughed, somehow, before it turned back and looked into that eye with a weak smile. Without the earth, it felt weak, unrooted...but maybe it was worth it. “Heh...I knew y-you were in there, Gaster…” it muttered, recognizing the look in that eye. It had seen it before, but different. It had been blue, and the final sight it had known before more resets than he cared to count.

Flowey hit the ground with a soft thump. It was very confused, understandably, it had been held a moment before. The flaming eye had died, and Papyrus had scrambled back, staring at his skeletal hands. That power, that anger...it hadn’t been him, and it scared him. He took a few, cautious steps back, giving Flowey a chance to re-root himself into the ground, turning his eyes up to Papyrus, once more filled with malice. “...fine then. Stay stupid, don’t save your brother, it’s on your head. Have fun~!” And with that, the ground seemed to open up below the flower, and it suddenly vanished down into it, gone in a heartbeat, leaving the skeleton standing there. He stared at the spot where Flowey had been a moment later, and after a moment, he stood and turned to leave. He...he had to see Sans.


	2. Chapter 2

“cheer up, papyrus. maybe they just werent in the mood for puzzles today. they did probably fall just a bit ago.”

“Still, they just walked through all of my puzzles like they were nothing! I’ve been preparing these for a long time, they didn’t even give them a chance.” Papyrus kicked a rock with his boot, watching it bounce along for a bit before lodging itself firmly in a bank of snow. Yes, he was very annoyed that all his puzzles and traps had fallen flat (The human was not even the slightest bit tempted by his plate of spaghetti!), but that wasn’t the real reason why he wasn’t happy. A nagging thought had remained in his head since he had come out here. If that little flower had been telling the truth about the human…

Was the rest of it true?

It couldn’t be, that little thing had just been trying to get his goat, trying to bring up that pit of rage Papyrus hadn’t known he had. And that stuff about Gaster, preposterous. That didn’t even sound like a real name. He had asked Sans and, despite seeming slightly shifty, hadn’t seemed to know who it was. While the name wasn’t being worried about, the rest of it was, and it made him uneasy.

“...yeah, i guess that was pretty uncool of them. tell you what, lets think of a puzzle thatll really knock their socks off, something they are gonna really appreciate.” Sans’s jaw clattered slightly as he smiled, putting Papyrus at ease. Sans wasn’t going to die, he could just feel it.

“Sans, your idea of a puzzle is a crossword. Maybe you should leave the puzzling to me.”

“aww, but crosswords are fun! plus its a pretty tough one” He added with a wink.

Papyrus cackled, grinning now. “Tough for a crossword, maybe. Which means it’s made for particularly advanced babies! Maybe we can have something far harder, like the horoscope or word jumble.”

“hey, youre the cool one here, you do you.” Sans smiled. “im gonna run to grillby’s, want anything?”

“Sans, we’re skeletons, we don’t need to eat.”

“your point?” He gave Papyrus one last grin before heading out of the house, leaving Papyrus to sit on the couch and think of new puzzles. Maybe a new, creative one would be enough to get the human to try them out.

It wasn’t until he heard the battering on the high windows that Papyrus glanced up from the paper before him, covered in squiggles of different colored crayons. He had just been adding the maze aspect before the interruption. Casting his empty eye sockets up, Papyrus was shocked to find not just a snowstorm raging outside, but also a darkened sky. Of course, they were underground, it wasn’t really ‘weather’ or ‘sky’, but wind and snow were still a thing down here and it was near impossible to see out of the window. But that wasn’t the part that had him worried.

Sans hadn’t come back.

He stood up and moved to the door, throwing his shoulder into it to force it open against the rising wind. Some snow blew in through the opening but that was unimportant for now, he had a mission, and the Great Papyrus did not fail at his missions. He turned right and headed with the wind down into the main body of town, the well worn track hidden amidst the newly shifting snow. The lights were on in all of the houses he passed, but Grillby’s was dark, the only light coming from the flickering of Grillby himself as he left through the Fire Exit towards his own home. Glancing inside the window, he found no one inside. So Sans had left...but where had he gone?

Papyrus turned back against the wind now, forcing himself to tread through the drifts towards the other edge of town. He could have gone to the shed, he thought, maybe. It was worth a shot at the very least. It was hard going against the wind and the snow, but he had to. As he walked, voices drifted back, carried by the wind. His skull turned slightly, if he had ears they would have been pointed towards the sound, hoping to pick up on the words.

“...come on…”

“...n’t want to do this, you kn…”

That was Sans’s voice, Papyrus realized with a start. The shorter of the skeleton brothers must have been a good deal ahead, him and whoever he was talking to were hidden in the dark and the swirling snow. He called out, as loud as he could, but the sound was snatched from his open jawbone and pulled backwards towards Snowdin.

It wasn’t easy, but he forced himself through the snow, towards where the voice had come from, where hopefully he still was. “SANS!” he tried again, but once more the words left his mouth before he could finish saying them. That pulse was back, a gentle pounding in his skull, but he pushed it aside. Something else was more important. Somewhere in the snowy distance, he had caught sight of something blue.

Papyrus trudged through the snow for a minute more before he could properly make it out. It was Sans’s jacket, for sure, in the middle of the path. But it was crumpled, as though it had fallen into a heap…

“No…” He whispered as he dashed forward, leaping forward the last few feet and landing on his knees before the jacket. Below it was a pair of slippers, all the clothing covered in a fine layer of dust.

“No, no no no no…” It had to be a prank. Sans was just kidding around, this was dirt, it had to be dirt, but it was too fine and silvery gray to be. Bony fingers clutched the jacket, realization hit him like a wave.

“ **NOOOOOOOOOOO!** ”

It was wordless, a scream of pain he felt deep down in his SOUL, like a dagger had been shoved into it and twisted like a top. Orange flames leapt from his right eyesocket, twisting and forming an eye, drawn wide in agony. The pulse was back, rattling every bone he had. And he let it in.

The jacket slipped, falling back to the snow again. Memory filled Papyrus, new ones. He remembered science, equations and calculations and the CORE, always the CORE, always back to falling, to the moment when his SOUL was broken in half. He remembered who he had been, a scientist, but he had been lost when he went through that door. Even with these memories, nothing has changed.

He was the Great Papyrus, and he was going to find who did this.

And he was going to make them pay.

“The human.” The voice was his, but it couldn't have been more different. It was cold, hollow, with none of the mirth that had marked his speech before. Papyrus stood slowly, picking up the jacket one more and flipping it around to put it on. It was a tight fit, but he bent his arms backwards and soon felt the jacket settle around his torso, a bit of dust falling from the pockets. At least he could keep something from his brother.

He began to walk, but a memory came floating up. Not one of his, but one of the old ones, of before. “...could be useful.” Papyrus muttered, snapping two skeletal fingers together on his right hand. Elsewhere, skulls floated from their hiding point amidst cave walls, south of Snowdin. They had once been His, the Gaster Blasters, long ago, but they belonged to Papyrus now. Pulling the jacket close, he began to head into Waterfall, the skulls floating in the air behind him.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

Undyne was the next to fall. He had given her warning of the human’s approach, and what they would do. She put up one hell of a fight, showing more power than Papyrus had ever seen from her, but even the Undying couldn't stand long. It did have a silver lining, though: she bought enough time for Dr. Alphys to evacuate Hotland and the CORE. Papyrus had helped, both with the more unruly monsters and with the puzzles Alphys couldn't crack.

Alphys and Papyrus stood opposite one another, each holding open a door as monsters filed through. Some were scared, some were excited, but most were just worried. “I think that's the last of them…” the scientist muttered as she glanced through the door, to hopeful safety. “...you could come with us.” She said, turning her eyes up to Papyrus’s eye sockets. She knew it wouldn't happen but…

“I can't.” Bone fingers trailed down, brushing the surface of a bottle that hung from his belt. Inside was a collection of silvery gray dust, along with a single small bone, the largest part of Sans he could find. “There's something I have to do.”

“I know.” Scaled hands closed around his skeletal ones. “...be c-careful, OK?”

Papyrus was silent for a few moments, before he nodded, turning to leave.

“Oh, Papyrus?” The voice caused him to turn back. Alphys’s head was sticking out from one of the open doors, her mouth curled into an anxious smile. “G-Give them hell.”

“Can do.” He gave her a sideways grin, before turning once more and striding away. Behind him, the door shut with a resounding boom. The sound of it locking echoed through the hallway. He paused about halfway down, a memory coming up, a recent one.

Undyne, standing on that bridge, laughing at the human even in the last moments of her life, dissolving with each word. He had watched from the Lab, helpless, but there was something he could do at least. He pictured the bridge, and a door linking the two, and stepped through.

Pop.

Boots stepped from stone and landed on wood. His bones rattled, he was not used to this yet, but he couldn't deny its usefulness. No wonder Sans pranked himself across space like this all the time, back when…

No, no use going down that road. He had already had many a nightmare about him, he didn't need waking ones too. Before him, in the middle of the bridge, was a large pile of silver dust. A few footprints marked the mound, as though someone had walked through with no care or thought about who they were walking through. Papyrus drew out a small bottle, much like the one already on his belt, and knelt down. He scooped some of the dust into the bottle, as much as he could fit. He found, discarded to the side, the broken tip of a spear, which he added to the bottle as well before sealing it. He stood, attaching it to his hip, where it hung next to Sans.

They were dead, not forgotten.

That new bottle, so small, held far more than just dust and spear. It held trainings in the snow, lessons on cooking spaghetti, and a promise. Papyrus tilted his head back and screamed.

It wasn't long, nor as painful as Sans, but he would mourn her all the same. The sound awakened the pulse and the eye once more, flaming in his right eye socket as his wordless cry of pain echoed through the caves, repeated back into the silence by the echo flowers.

Without Undyne, or the other two warriors, there was only one member of the Royal Guard left. He clenched his first, the sound fading from his own clenched jaw. Only one person could protect Asgore- no, the world- now. With his skeletal fists clenched tight, he stepped through the Door once more, imagining New Home.

It would stop there.

* * *

 

New Home had never been this quiet. With so many monsters dead and the rest with Dr. Alphys hiding somewhere safe, the normally teeming city was practically abandoned. Silence reigned dead houses and streets, a slow wind from somewhere brushing about dirt and leaves and twigs. The only sound that wasn’t ‘natural’ was slow, echoing footsteps from far away.

A single small child walked the streets now, the sounds of the footsteps coming from their small feet. Brown hair fell along the child’s face, covering their eyes from view. Even so, they seemed to know where they were going, turning corners with pinpoint precision, seemingly driven by some force that no one could see.

It was this strange force that finally lead the child to a very particularly corridor deep within New Home. They left the gray, lifeless exterior until they entered bright, golden light. Their whole body was cast in dark shade, as though they were a shadow in the hallway. Their footsteps became near silent, the open spaces of New Home weren’t producing the echoes anymore, now it was just the golden hallway, the Final Corridor. They crossed the hallway, about halfway, before they paused between pillars. Someone else was there.

Papyrus stood sideways, looking up at the stained glass windows. He still wore the blue jacket, although in the yellow light it had more of a green color. Hanging from the belt on his waist, two bottles swung gently, clinking against each other with every shift. In his right hand, he held a long bone, like a femur but nearly a meter and a half in length, which at the moment he was holding like a staff as kept staring, unmoving. The only even slight movement were shadows behind the pillars, single white lights that faded back into the darkness when the child tried to see them.

“...my brother always loved this view.”

His voice was quiet, level, only hinting at the anger that the pool of rage behind it. The skull lowered slightly, if he had eyelids they would have closed. “You know…I believed in you.” He took a step back, his left hand shifting almost instinctively back to the bottles on his hip. The child kept looking, not moving.

“At one point I believed that there could be good in anyone. That anyone, no matter what, could become a good person.” The left bone fingers wrapped into a tight fist. “I thought...maybe some puzzles, some pasta...I thought that I, the Great Papyrus, could be the one that would bring the good out of you.”

The child’s fingers closed tightly around the handle of the blade in their hand, reflecting both golden light and a reflection of the skeleton, who had now turned to them, those empty eye sockets staring daggers into them.

“But if there’s one thing that I’ve learned, it’s this.”

The bone blurred through the air as he brought it up, holding it in front of him like a sword, held in one bony finger. Orange burned in the right socket, catching the child with what could only be considered a look full of loathing. Behind him, things floated from behind the pillar, skulls that he had gained after his brother had fallen. A last gift, of sorts, of who he used to be.

“ _ **You’re not worth saving**_.”

 


	4. Chapter 4

You stand there in the light from the hallway, looking up at the skeleton standing there, holding that huge bone like it was a staff. And to its credit, the bone moved like a whisper in the air, weaving patterns between the strange skull-things that floated behind him. The other brother had been easy enough to destroy, the blade cleaving through the bones and killing him. And to think he hadn’t even put up any sort of fight, just kept offering to head back to some stupid restaurant. But this one...was different. Your SOUL seemed to appear, a cartoonish red heart that moved around before your chest.

* Check

 

Papyrus - Atk: ?? Def: ??

He remembers what you’ve done.

 

The hand with the knife paused. Every enemy had some amount of information they could gather, but for some reason Papyrus was...unreadable. That could be good, hiding his weakness, but it could be so much worse. Perhaps you could try to weaken them through talking, or at least get a sense of how strong Papyrus really was.

Unfortunately, you weren’t given a chance. Papyrus slammed the bone into the earth, sending out a shockwave that caused you to stumble, your heart falling to the earth, a new deep blue. More bones shot up from the ground and shot at you from all directions. You had been caught off guard, but you had no trouble leaping over them, barely staying in one place for more than a heartbeat. Your SOUL jumped with you, keeping clear of the skeletal assault.

* Talk

You tried to talk, but there was no response. Instead, Papyrus flicked his free hand, sending you and your heart flying to the wall, a row of bones flying at them. You crouched, dodging a few before kicking off the wall and spinning through the air to dodge the rest. One of them grazed the floating red heart, causing your hand to spasm slightly. Holy crap, that hurt. One brush cut off a huge junk of your health. Maybe there was some other option, you needed to tone down that damage or you’d not survive this fight.

* Flirt

That actually made Papyrus pause for a few moments. A skull wasn’t the most...expressive of mediums, but still, you recognized that expression. Loathing.

“Whatever you are...you have no redeeming qualities.”

You blinked, and Papyrus was gone. Before you could react, you felt the bone slam into you, piercing your chest and going through to your SOUL. It was like being stricken by lightning, your health depleting in moments before your vision went dark. For a few moments, Papyrus grinned, the deed was done.

He blinked, and he was back in the hallway, staring up at the light once more.

 

He blinked a few times, glancing down at the bone in his hand. What was that? Did he just imagine that or something? If it had, that had been a very realistic daydream. He heard a few footsteps, the human was entering the hallway again, the exact same way too. He would frown, if the jawbone would allow for that, but he picked up his bone-staff once again.

“You go no further, human.” He declared in his best, authoritative voice. It was the voice he was saving for the Royal Guard. He slammed the bone staff into the ground, causing the same shockwave as that strange vision. Unlike it, though, the human kicked off and dodged it with ease, the following bone storm as well. The wave of Gaster Blasters, though, they didn't fare quite so well. The beams of intense light seared the child as they fell to earth, sticking the landing, but just barely. A blade flashed, glinting in the light from the windows, aimed directly for Papyrus.

Clang.

The blade bounced harmlessly off of the staff, which had seemingly appeared in front of him, in front of that glowing eye. “Did you really think I was going to stand here and take an attack?” He hissed, the sound whistling through a clenched jaw before the child blinked, and he was gone.

The same move didn't work twice. The stab passed through where their torso had been, but the human had darted aside, aiming a counter-slash which was deflected just as easily as the first one. Just as the knife was lifted again, Papyrus flicked his hand, sending the human flying to the far end of the corridor, bones erupting from the walls to make a sort of maze.

A sort of maze they weren't prepared for. They bounced from bone to bone, SOUL grazed and battered until finally he heard the sound of it breaking.

And once more, he was in the Final Hallway, staring up at the light.

Papyrus shook his head, trying to clear his mind. These...hallucinations, they had to be, what else could they be? But the human knew his attacks, dodged them perfectly until he had gotten beyond the vision.

You know what they are.

The voice was soft, as though whispered from a great distance and right beside him at the same time. It floated on the edges of his mind, coming from the same place the pulse came. He couldn't focus on it now, he had to beat this human. He could figure out these visions later.

“You go no further, human.”

 

You enter the hallway for the tenth time. This one was much stronger than his brother. That one had just stood there while you had cut him down. **Where I had cut him down.** He had pleaded for you to stop, but you didn't. This skeleton was tougher, he was far more intense in his attacks and refused to be talked into lowering his guard. You idly considered a reset, but you had come too far to go back and try for an easier ending.

**Besides, this was more fun.**

He was angrier this time. He didn't even try to quip or say something stupid, instead he just leapt right into the fight. Good thing you're becoming used to this. You began to anticipate the next attack, staying just ahead of the bones and Gaster Blasters. You kept attacking every chance you had, but he kept blocking and teleporting and being a pain.

Your health remained high despite the skeleton’s best efforts, and it was showing. The hand gripping the staff was tighter, shaking slightly with exertion. A single bead of sweat ran down the side of his skull. Where it came from you didn't know, and didn't care. You'd wear him down, eventually every attack becomes predictable. He couldn't block forever.

Clang, another slash was deflected. Just like before, he warped to the side, aiming a hard slash upwards with you dodge by leaning back. The bone was closer this time, whistling past your ear and ruffling your hair. He was getting angry. And that was good. Anger was energizing, but this was hot anger, and that would make him slip up. **And that’s when I’m going to strike.**

You stepped back, turning your knife in your hand as Papyrus stepped back, his eye flashing orange before you felt that chill in your SOUL, turning it a deep blue. A second later, you felt yourself flying up towards the ceiling. You’d seen this move before, you had barely touched the tile before the Gaster Blasters flew up into a grid, blasting the area where you had been a second before. His hand flicked back and forth, sending you flying into the walls, the ceiling, the floor: You having to twist and move and keep dodging the beams. You landed back on the ground, heart turning back to red as his concentration broke. You hadn’t even been scratched.

Eventually everything became predictable. 


	5. Chapter 5

Thirty six.

Thirty seven. 

Thirty eight...

The observer counted, a skeletal left hand floating by his side with all five fingers extended, the right with the thumb and two more. Three small orbs floated in the holes of his palms, keeping the tens-digit stored in a way. Despite being just a bit behind the other angry skeleton (And a bit to the left but that’s unimportant), stray bones flew around him, through him, not even whistling the dark outfit he wore. It was as though he wasn’t even here. 

Thirty nine.

He got bored with counting in base ten, switching to a binary counting system. The lights disappeared, and he dropped his fingers into his fists. Turning his hands face up, he raised his right pinky finger, the thumb and first two on the left hand. 

111001.

He sighed, dropping his hands. This was going nowhere, Papyrus was becoming predictable, and he’d die if he became predictable. The phantom drifted forward, floating past the physical skeleton and watching sideways as he blocked a knife-swing with that bone staff of his. The human had its eyes nearly closed, but still looking at Papyrus with a level of Determination. Eyesockets flicked up behind the human, seeing the...thing floating just behind them. It was human-shaped, but he knew better. The raw hate and determination of it was putting out he could feel, and every time they reset the spirit was just a little bit more solid, just a bit more real. As they gained shape, they mirrored the real human’s motions, following and helping. It wasn’t going to last long. 

Gaster drifted back to Papyrus, in the middle of throwing the human around with that gravity ability he had grown so fond of. If that spirit could help the human, there was no reason he couldn’t help Papyrus. He was a part of him after all, he just had to find it. It was only half of his soul...but maybe he could cheat. He stepped up behind Papyrus, sliding forward until…

Suddenly his mind was filled with thoughts, emotions, sensations: and for a few moments everything was pushing and forcing and trying to get him out. Gaster tightened his grip, reaching through the mind. He had been a spirit for so long, it was easy to slip into that skull. The thoughts were focused on the new intrusion, so much that the new inhabitant had to take over, taking a few half-steps back and spinning the staff to knock the human off its feet. For a small moment, there was a flicker of blue inside the left eye socket, but it faded a second later. There wasn’t enough of Gaster to make it solid. With a swipe, Papyrus sent them flying back against the far wall, not throwing them about but instead just pinning them there. 

‘Papyrus, you’re smarter than this. Figure it out, think. What would I do?’

The skeletal hand paused, power still focusing on keeping the human against the wall, the most they could do was squirm and make feeble slashes at the air. ‘You’re smarter than this, your brother might have gotten all of the knowledge but you have the cleverness. Think, look at it from another angle.’ 

The staff spun again, knocking aside the human as they came loose, moving to the defensive. Gaster could feel the thoughts in the skeleton’s skull focus intently on the situation, not the fight. In fact, it was enough focus for Gaster to need to take over again, moving just enough to keep out of harm’s way, giving Papyrus the time to think. Come on, he had half the soul of the most clever skeleton to hold the position of Royal Scientist. 

Suddenly he felt it. The chaos of thoughts inside the mind suddenly became focused, calm, singular. He had it. The spirit loosened his grip on Papyrus, floating backwards through the beam from a Gaster Blaster that shot right at the Human. They had tried to dodge, but with a swipe they had flown right into it, their SOUL shattering into pieces. In a few moments, it would reset again. But this time it would be different. 

* * *

You walked down the corridor, fingers closed around the knife, and Determination coursing through you with every beat of your crimson SOUL. Behind you, invisible, but you could feel them just behind your step, a silent partner. You could feel them, you noticed it a long time ago. A push, a gentle whisper, an insistence to keep pressing forward. To gain as much LOVE as you could, to make it through this place as strong as you could. And you were glad that you did,  **I will need all of that as soon as I make it to the surface** . 

You came to a stop in front of Papyrus. You expected a quick quip, or maybe just an attack, but you paused. The skeleton was facing the windows again, with an unfamiliar expression on his skull. Happiness? No, not quite right. Satisfaction...no, that wasn’t it either. Before you could figure it out he spun on his heel, facing you. There was no burning fire in his right eye, but you could read the expression even without any expression in his eye sockets.

He was Determined. 

“I know what you’re doing.” He said simply, giving you that piercing glare. Before, that might have made you step back, to be worried. But now you faced him directly, that urge to get past, to get that EXP to finish the game.

“You think you’re so clever, but I’ve seen through your little charade. I’ve played games before, you know. And I’ve lost before, too. And when I did, I wanted to try again, just like you. So I reset.” 

The word made you suddenly worried, like an ice cube just hit your stomach.  **It didn’t matter if he knew, I can take him out regardless.** “So you can try again and again, as many times as you want. So no matter what I do, I can never win, since you can try again and again as many times as you like until either you give up, or you learn my moves enough to win. I bet that’s what you want, isn’t it?” 

You looked up into those empty eye sockets, staring at him and hoping to seem braver than you felt. His new attitude was different and it was worrying you. “Well I have some news for you, little human. I’m not going to just throw the same attacks at you until you learn my moves like second nature. That just sounds like a bad time. Instead, I think I’m going to just...have some fun with it.” Gaster Blasters floated up to either side of him, their eyes glinting in a mirror of their master’s mood. “Who knows, maybe you’ll give up. If you do...I guess I’ll just wake up and this never happened. Maybe there’s a good person in there, maybe there isn’t. If there is, you’ll know to give up. But either way…~”

It came so fast you almost missed it. Two more Blasters had slid up to either side, nearly catching you by surprise as they sent a huge beam of power that met in the middle. You managed to duck backwards, the beam meeting in the middle and creating a beam. But it was simple for only a second, they began to spin like a conjoined top, making you sprint to keep up with the spin of the laser. Halfway through the circle the Blasters changed direction, making you skid and move in the other direction, trying to keep as close as you could to the middle. Right as you saw them losing power, the one of them splitting up and moving in the other direction. It caught you off guard, and in seconds the power ripped through your SOUL and you died. And you had a feeling you’d be doing that a lot in the coming tries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this was long in the coming, hope you guys like it! :D


	6. Chapter 6

The human darted side to side, ducking between each wave of bones that came flying at them. Each bunch moved so fast it was nearly a blur, there was little room for error. Their SOUL was floating, chipped from bones around the edges, their HP under half. The last one, a solid wall from the waist up, was dodged narrowly with some of the finest limbo skill ever seen. It didn’t help, though, since Papyrus at that moment had turned their heart blue and threw them up into the bones. What health they had left was gone in seconds. 

Papyrus dodged to the left, the human’s slash whistling through empty air as it always did. He spun like a top, the long bone held low and knocking out their legs. The human fell back, landing on the ground just in time for him to stop spinning and slam the bone straight down into their chest, shattering their SOUL.

It was like a web of death, Gaster Blasters firing in near every direction, with no rhyme or reason that the human could follow. They ducked, leapt, jumped to the side, fast but not quite fast enough. Their hand was seared with the laser, a second later the right leg, health pouring from their HP gauge like water from an open bottle. They had just stood back up when one of the skull-like items dropped in front of them. Its jaws were open, and the laser was charging. They didn’t even put up a fight, taking it full in the face. Might as well reset.

A low flung bone, making them trip and fall face first into a pile of sharpened bones. Reset. 

Stabbed in the heart with that staff, reset. 

Reset. 

Reset. 

Papyrus laughed, this new way of fighting was so much more fun than before. No longer set to a specific rhythm, he was changing up the patterns with every reset, doing everything within his power to make the human pay for trying to memorize his attacks. He flicked his finger joints, sending the Gaster Blasters out into the hall, their beams ripping up golden tiles almost at random. The human dodged rather impressively, managing to make it up to him and slash into the empty air where Papyrus had been standing a second before. A moment later, a circle of Blasters descended, catching the human in the trap and obliterating them. 

He was standing in the hallway again, staring up at the great stained glass. How long would the human keep this up? They were certainly Determined to beat him, but Papyrus didn’t plan on dying anytime soon. He couldn’t just reset, but instead he would last as long as he could, with one overarching hope: They would finally give up. 

He turned his head and watched the human seemly blink into existence at the end of the hall. He considered tripping them up with a bone tripwire halfway down the hall, but nah. He had done that only two resets ago, they might still be expecting it. Instead, he slowly began to drop two Gaster Blasters behind them, silent and directed by the flaming orange eye. They fell slowly to ground level, charging their beams as Papyrus grinned. 

Probably shouldn’t have smiled. The human suddenly leaned back, the lasers passing just a hair's breadths above their body, the tip of their shirt being singed. With a flick bones leapt from the ground, but the flipped back, just passing the ends of the lasers and rolling out of the way of the trap. The bone-staff was flicked with an easy motion, and it spun through the air like a boomerang. They darted to the side, only getting a light graze. As soon as the bone was passed there was a soft ping as the human pressed the FIGHT button. The slash passed through air as Papyrus jumped behind the human, catching the bone on its return journey, and using its momentum to slam it into the tiles with monstrous strength. The ground was dented from the force, but they dodged yet again. 

“Just give up already!” Papyrus roared towards the human, who was panting lightly, the hand with the knife clasped over their upper arm, a bit of blood staining their sweater. They were hurt, but at his words they pulled their hand away, their right hand tightening on the knife handle. They weren’t going to take the easy way out. 

“Why?” Papyrus called after the next reset, turning to face the human as they approached down the hall, not throwing up any traps this time. But after the first slash all that Mercy went away, and went on full offensive, blocking each swing with his staff before disjointing his spine, hips spinning and legs flicking out, knocking out the human’s feet, the staff spinning and crashing through their SOUL in an easy stab. 

“What are you gaining from all this? You’re never going to win. You will NEVER get to King Dreemurr.” The staff impacted the human behind the knees, making them cry out and fall forward into a bed of bones. Reset. 

“Just!” A Gaster Blaster screamed by, carving up the floor, making the human roll, directly into another one. Reset. 

“Give!” Waves of bones, like a storm of bullets, flew at them and they limped out, cuts all along their body, HP dropping down to the single digits. Their knife knocked away, and their breathing heavy, they looked up as Papyrus drew the staff. It pierced their body and lifted them from the ground, the word “UP!” resounding in their ears as it went black. 

But they didn’t give up. Again and again the human came, and again and again Papyrus changed his tactics, tripping them up and making them reset. It was a puzzle, a macabre game of death and life, but a puzzle nonetheless. He blocked a furious slash with an almost lazy raising of his staff, laughing as he teleported behind them, starting to summon a few layers of bones. 

The laughter died halfway to his jaw, the bones falling with a loud clatter to the broken golden tiles, fading away. Papyrus slowly glanced down, seeing the hilt of the knife sitting nicely in the middle of his chest. The human stood a ways away, slightly panting. They had taken a chance and thrown the knife, and it had worked. Even they were surprised, the eyes were actually open as Papyrus’s knees gave out. He slumped forward, hands moving up to the knife, pulling it out and tossing it away. It was too late, though, he could feel his body starting to melt, the magic failing with his SOUL. 

On his knees, Papyrus watched as his bones started to fade, dust pouring from his clothes and beginning to amass about the ground. The rest of his body faded away in only a few seconds, his clothes collapsing and creating a small cloud as his skull bounced a ways down the hall, landing on it’s side facing the stained glass again. For a second, the way the shadows were falling, he could see a figure standing there, hands in his hoodie pockets and a smile on his face. Just the sight made Papyrus smile as well. 

“Don’t worry, Sans...I’ll meet you at Grillby’s.”

 

* * *

 

The blackness was crushing, all encompassing. Twisting, pushing, screaming-

“AAAAAAAAAAAAANS!” 

Papyrus shot up in bed, waking up halfway through the scream, his right eye burning orange as his bones gripped the covers of the bed. Almost immediately he heard the sounds of footfalls, muffled by slippers, coming down the hall. But by the time the door was opened, the eye was already gone, the memories fading. 

It took him a few second before he realized sans was talking. “...ok are you ok papyrus talk to me whats going on” Sans was saying, and Papyrus smiled a bit, resting a hand on his brother’s shoulder as he sat up. 

“I’m fine, Sans, just...just a bad dream.” He said with an offhanded laugh, patting him as he moved to stand up. “I shouldn’t have slept anyways, skeletons don’t even really need sleep. I think you might be rubbing off on me!”

 

The silhouette of the laughing skeleton was visible from the woods behind the house. There was a single figure watching, only barely there, barely a shadow themselves. Without saying a word, or really making any sort of sound at all, they turned and started to drift back into the trees. 

Well, it had been a fun diversion while it had lasted. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who left nice comments and stuck with this. School and life got in the way and blarg, hope you like the finished result everyone <3


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